The West is “culpable” for the unnecessary deaths in the Ukraine war, a former UK defence chief has claimed.

It’s estimated that more than one million Ukrainians and Russians have been killed or wounded since Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Russia’s  European neighbour almost three years ago.

Lord Richards, the UK’s chief of the defence staff between 2010 and 2013, claimed today that the the West encouraged Ukraine to fight on when it should have started negotiating.

While making it clear he defends the country’s right to defend itself, he suggested that Kyiv reached “the high watermark of its efforts” in autumn 2022 – and should have started negotiating then.

Speaking to Radio 4′s World at One, he said: “Sadly, many many people, who should have known better, encouraged Ukraine to go on and the results is many thousands more have died and the economy is not looking good.”

On the UK specifically, Richards said: “I am sorry to say that while our motives were fine, if, as any strategist will tell you, the ends, ways, and means don’t stack up, then that is a bad strategy.

“We were encouraging Ukraine to fight on without giving them the means to fight, and certainly not the means to win.”

BBC presenter Sarah Montague asked: “Are you suggesting, in a way, that the UK bears some responsibility for unnecessary deaths in Ukraine since then?”

Richards replied: “I don’t think it was maligned, but the whole of the West by encouraging Ukraine to fight on without making sure that that objective, their objective [...] to kick Russia out of all the pre-2014 territory that Russia had annexed, without giving them the means to do that, there’s no doubt that people have died in the solid belief that they were going to win, but we know that was never likely.

“So to that degree, the West is culpable, yes.”

US president-elect Donald Trump has said he will push for the war to end when he gets into the White House, but he has not explained how – sparking fears he would encourage Kyiv to cede occupied land to Putin.

In the meantime, Russia is now gaining ground in Ukraine at its fastest rate since 2022.

But Ukraine’s allies, like the UK, have made it clear it is up to Kyiv as to how to negotiate a settlement – which is a mistake, according to Richards.

He said: “We are rather irresponsibly giving away a key part of our foreign policy to another nation, and yet we’re not giving them the means to actually succeed.”

He said it was “immoral” to do that, and downplayed what impact the UK’s (and the US’s) decision to give Ukraine permission to use long-range missiles to strike at targets within Russia.

Coming at the subject matter as a “hard-nosed realist”, Richards said: “I don’t think these Storm Shadows will have a strategic effect on the outcome of the war, and therefore they’re probably not going to do more than further annoy the Russians without having material impact on how things pan out.”

He added: “I never saw the west being able to replicate Russia’s view of Ukraine as an existential issue for us. The result is that we have given Ukraine, for what of a better term, too little too late.”

The former defence chief also dismissed foreign secretary David Lammy’s suggestion that UK troops could act as peacekeepers in the region if a ceasefire was agreed, saying that would act as a “red rag to a bull” for Putin.